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Help! (album)
Help! is the fifth British and tenth North American album by English rock group the Beatles, and the soundtrack from their film Help!. Produced by George Martin for EMI's Parlophone Records, it contains fourteen songs in its original British form, of which seven appeared in the film. These songs took up the first side of the vinyl album and included the singles "Help!" and "Ticket to Ride". The second side contained seven other releases including the most-covered song ever written, "Yesterday".[13] The American release was a true soundtrack album, mixing the first seven songs with orchestral material from the film. Of the other seven songs that were on the British release, two were released on the US version of the next Beatles album,Rubber Soul, two were back-to-back on the next US single and then appeared on Yesterday and Today, and three had already been on Beatles VI. In 2012, Help! was voted 331st on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time".[14] In September 2013, after the British Phonographic Industry changed their sales award rules, the album was declared as having gone platinum.[15] Contents http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help!_(album)# hide *1 Music **1.1 Rejected songs *2 Album cover *3 Compact disc release *4 Track listing *5 North American Capitol release **5.1 Track listing *6 Chart positions *7 Certifications *8 Personnel *9 Surround versions *10 Release history *11 References *12 External links Musichttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=1 edit The album features Paul McCartney's "Yesterday", arranged for guitar and string quartet and recorded without the other group members. John Lennon's "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away" indicates the influence of Bob Dylan and includes classical flutes. While several compositions on 1964's Beatles for Sale, as well as "I'll Cry Instead" from A Hard Day's Night, had leaned in a country and western direction, McCartney's "I've Just Seen a Face" was almost pure country, taken at such a fast tempo that it might have been bluegrass if not for the absence of banjo and fiddle.[16] "Ticket to Ride", also released as a single, was felt by Lennon to be "heavy" in its sound compared to the group's previous output[17] and daring in its reference to a boy and girl living together. McCartney called the arrangement "quite radical". George Harrison contributed "I Need You" and "You Like Me Too Much", his first compositions to be included on a Beatles album since "Don't Bother Me" on 1963's With the Beatles. The record contained two cover versions and a few tracks more closely related to the group's previous pop output, yet still marked a decisive step forward. The record sleeve-note shows that Lennon and McCartney made more extensive and prominent use of keyboards, previously played unobtrusively by Martin. Four-track overdubbing technology encouraged this. Lennon, for his part, made much greater use of acoustic guitar, forsaking his famous Rickenbacker. All these developments can be traced to the previous Beatles for Sale, where they were less obvious because that album had been recorded more hastily, lacked chart hits and contained many cover versions.[citation needed] The original LP's format of featuring songs from the soundtrack on side one and non-soundtrack songs on side two follows the format of A Hard Day's Night. When "Help!" came out in '65, I was actually crying out for help. Most people think it's just a fast rock-'n'-roll song. I didn't realize it at the time; I just wrote the song because I was commissioned to write it for the movie. But later, I knew I really was crying out for help. It was my fat Elvis period. You see the movie: He — I — is very fat, very insecure, and he's completely lost himself. And I am singing about when I was so much younger and all the rest, looking back at how easy it was. Now I may be very positive — yes, yes — but I also go through deep depressions where I would like to jump out the window, you know. It becomes easier to deal with as I get older; I don't know whether you learn control or, when you grow up, you calm down a little. Anyway, I was fat and depressed and I was crying out for help. John Lennon[18] In later years, Lennon stated that the album's title track was a sincere cry for help; he regretted changing it from a downbeat, piano-driven ballad to an uptempo pop song, which was done only as a result of commercial pressures.[19][20] Help! was the band's final British album (except for the late 1966 "oldies" album) to feature any cover songs until 1970's''Let It Be'' (which included a performance of the traditional folk song "Maggie Mae"). (In 1966, Capitol would release "Act Naturally", already on the British Help! album, on Yesterday and Today, and later in 1966 Parlophone would release that "oldies" album, which included "Bad Boy"; both songs had been recorded before Help! was released.) Rejected songshttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=2 edit A few songs that were intended for the film were not used because of the Beatles' suggestions. Lennon and McCartney wrote "If You've Got Trouble" for Ringo Starr to sing, but the song was rejected and Starr sang "Act Naturally" (which is not in the film but is about being in the movies) instead.[21] "That Means a Lot" was written for the film, but the Beatles were not satisfied with their performance of the song and they gave it to P.J. Proby, who released it as a single.[22]Lennon said "Yes It Is" was "me trying a rewrite of 'This Boy', but it didn't work";[23] it was released as the B-side of "Ticket to Ride" and was also on Beatles VI. "You Like Me Too Much" and "Tell Me What You See" were rejected for use in the film by its director, Richard Lester, though they did appear on the album (and also on Beatles VI).[citation needed] Much later, in June 1965, the song "Wait" was recorded for the album. However, "Wait" (with some newly added overdubs) ended up on Rubber Soul when another song was needed to complete that album. Album coverhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=3 edit The album cover features the Beatles with their arms positioned to spell out a word in flag semaphore. According to cover photographer Robert Freeman, "I had the idea of semaphore spelling out the letters "HELP". But when we came to do the shot, the arrangement of the arms with those letters didn't look good. So we decided to improvise and ended up with the best graphic positioning of the arms."[24] On the UK Parlophone release, the letters formed by the Beatles appear to be "NUJV", whilst the slightly re-arranged US release on Capitol Records appeared to feature the letters "NVUJ", with McCartney's left hand pointing to the Capitol logo.[25] The Capitol LP was issued in a "deluxe" gatefold sleeve with several photos from the film and was priced $1 more than standard Capitol releases at the time. Compact disc releasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=4 edit There have been three CD releases of Help! The first was on 30 April 1987, using the 14-song UK track line-up. Having been available only as an import in the US in the past, the original 14-track UK version replaced the original US version with its release on LP and cassette as well on 21 July 1987. As with the CD release of the 1965 Rubber Soul album, the Help! CD featured a contemporary stereo digital remix of the album prepared by Martin in 1986. Martin had expressed concern to EMI over the original 1965 stereo remix, claiming it sounded "very woolly, and not at all what I thought should be a good issue". Martin went back to the original four-tracks tapes and remixed them for stereo.[26] One of the most notable changes is the echo added to "Dizzy Miss Lizzy", something that was not evident on the original mix of the LP. When the album was originally released on CD in Canada, pressings were imported from other countries, and used the 1987 remix. However, when the Disque Améric and Cinram plants in Canada started pressing the album, the original 1965 stereo mix was used by mistake. This was the only source for the 1965 stereo mix in its entirety until the release of the mono box set in 2009.[27] The 2009 remastered stereo CD was released on 9 September. It was "created from the original stereo digital master tapes from Martin's CD mixes made in 1986".[28]The disc in the mono box set contains the 1965 mono mix as well as the 1965 stereo mix. Track listinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=5 edit All songs written and composed by Lennon–McCartney, except where noted. North American Capitol releasehttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=6 edit |- | colspan="2" style="vertical-align:top;text-align:center;"| |- style="text-align:center;" ! colspan="3" style="vertical-align:top;background:rgb(220,220,220);"|Singles from Help! |- style="vertical-align:top;line-height:11px;" | colspan="3" style="vertical-align:top;"| #"Ticket to Ride" Released: 19 April 1965 #"Help!" Released: 19 July 1965[29] |} The North American version, the band's eighth Capitol Records album and tenth overall, includes the songs in the film plus selections from the orchestral score composed and conducted by Ken Thorne, which contains one of the first uses of the Indian sitar on a rock/pop album. "Ticket to Ride" is the only song on the American release in duophonic stereo (also known as "fake stereo") reprocessed from the mono mix. This album is available on CD as part of The Capitol Albums, Volume 2 box set. This set also includes the mono version of the American release, which is purely a stereo-to-mono fold-down mix, including the "fake stereo" duophonic "Ticket To Ride" folded down to mono, despite Capitol already having the mono mixes for the single releases of both that song and "Help!". A second CD release of this album, which contained the seven songs in true mono was issued in 2014 individually and part of the Beatles The U.S. Albums boxed set. The American version of "Help!" reached the number one spot on the Billboard album charts for nine weeks starting on 11 September 1965. Track listinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=7 edit All songs written and composed by Lennon–McCartney, except where noted. Chart positionshttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=8 edit Certificationshttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=9 edit BPI certification awarded only for sales since 1994.[34] | style="width:518.799987792969px;vertical-align:top;"| ;North American release |} Personnelhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=10 edit According to Mark Lewisohn[37][38] and Alan W. Pollack.[39] *John Lennon – lead, harmony and background vocals; acoustic (six and twelve-string) and rhythm guitars; electric piano *Paul McCartney – lead, harmony and background vocals; lead, acoustic and bass guitars; lead guitar on "Another Girl" and "Ticket to Ride"; keyboards (acoustic and electric pianos); güiro *George Harrison – lead, harmony and background vocals; acoustic, rhythm and lead guitars *Ringo Starr – drums, handclaps and assorted percussion (tambourine, maracas, cowbell, bongos, claves and brushed snare); lead vocals (on "Act Naturally") ;Additional musicians *George Martin – piano and producer *John Scott – flutes on "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away" *String quartet on "Yesterday", arranged by Martin in association with McCartney Surround versionshttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=11 edit The songs included in the soundtrack of the film Help! were mixed into 5.1 surround sound for the film's 2007 DVD release, that is, tracks 1—7, accounting for half of the original album's songs. Release historyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help!_(album)&action=edit&section=12 edit Category:1965 albums